


Tied

by Bork__Bork



Category: BNA: Brand New Animal (Anime)
Genre: Brief mention of war/violence?, Fluff and Angst, I'm awful at tagging, M/M, that's basically it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-26
Updated: 2020-10-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:33:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27204584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bork__Bork/pseuds/Bork__Bork
Summary: Michiru invites Pingua over to help give Shirou a new hairstyle. Certain things are discovered, intentionally and unintentionally.
Relationships: Kagemori Michiru & Ogami Shirou, Kagemori Michiru & Pinga, Ogami Shirou & Pinga, Ogami Shirou/Pinga
Comments: 8
Kudos: 60





	Tied

**Author's Note:**

> Wow it has been uh, *checks calendar*, 9 months since I last published anything. I've been in love with pingashirou ever since BNA aired and I'm glad to finally be able to post a fic for this rarepair! I hope my writing is not too rusty eheheh. I hope you enjoy!

“Hmmmmmmm…”

Michiru’s head sat in her palms as she stared intensely at Shirou during their usual breakfast routine. Shirou tried to pay her no mind as he flipped through the daily newspaper, but he couldn’t help but glance up at the young tanuki girl, who seemed to be deep in thought. Eventually, he gave up, breaking the silence with a sigh.

“What is it, Michiru?” he asked, setting the newspaper down.

“Mmmmmm… I was just thinking how’d you look with a new hairstyle,” Michiru said, tilting her head slightly.

“A new hairstyle? You think I need one?” Shirou raised his eyebrows as he subconsciously ran his fingers through his hair. Well, it’s true he hasn’t changed his haircut in forever, quite literally. He’s never really put too much thought into his appearance, so the thought of changing it up has never crossed his mind. It’s not like there’s anything wrong with his current hairstyle anyways, right?

“Oh, I-I’m not saying it looks bad or anything,” Michiru flailed her hands around in defense. “I just saw this cool hairstyle on Instagram, and I thought maybe it’d look good on you…” Michiru chuckled awkwardly as she turned her phone towards Shirou. 

There was a dim picture of a handsome man holding his hair up into a ponytail while smoking a cigarette. For a brief moment, Shirou’s senses heightened, and his pulse quickened. Something about him seemed to draw him in, but the photo was too dark to make out his face clearly. He squinted at it a bit more before waving the phone away with his hand.

“So,” Shirou swallowed, trying to shove down the strange feeling that crept up in his stomach, “you just want to tie my hair up? Should be simple enough, I suppose. My hair isn’t as long as his, though.”

“Well, yeah, but even a tiny ponytail would look cute, wouldn’t it?”

“…Cute?” Shirou scratched the back of his head before sighing again. “I guess it couldn't hurt to try.” 

“Really? That’s awesome!” Michiru cheered, but then the glimmer in her eyes quickly vanished. “…Shoot, I don’t have a hairband, eheheh…”

Shirou rolled his eyes in response. “I’m not going to buy one for you.”

“Ugh, you’re so stingy, Shirou. It’s not even one dollar!”

“You still haven’t paid me back for that sim card you bought from that mink.”

“Yeah, yeah…” Michiru sank her head into her palms again, trying to think of a solution. “Oh, I know!”

Michiru’s face lit up as she immediately tapped away on her phone.

“Who are you texting? Nazuna?” Shirou asked with his eyebrows furrowed.

“Nah, you’ll see, you’ll see…” Michiru gestured him away before leaving the room.

Shirou gave a skeptical look before sighing again and rubbing his forehead. Who in the world would she bother over such a trivial matter?

...

“So... why’d you call _him_ here?”

Shirou was sitting in the lounge chair on the roof, his arms crossed in disapproval as the albatross landed.

“Nice to see you again, Mr. Pingua!” Michiru waved.

“Hey kid, nice to see you, too. You as well, Shirou.”

A pair of friendly coral eyes greeted the wolf, who immediately turned his head away with a grunt.

“Aw, don’t be so cold, now,” Pingua said with an easy tone.

Shirou wasn’t sure when his dislike towards Pingua started. Of course, at first, he deemed him a threat to Anima-City. But now, it’s clear that, if anything, he deeply cared about other beastmen. Yet, this strange feeling continued to linger within him whenever he saw him. It twisted his stomach, made his heart beat faster, overwhelmed his senses; it irritated him, yet it felt… familiar, somehow. And warm. 

God, this wasn’t like him.

“Anyways, young miss told me all about it. I’m here to give you a lil' makeover, is that right?” Pingua winked.

Shirou rolled his eyes and held out his hand. “Just give me the hairband.”

“Eh? Michiru told me that you needed my help tying up your hair.”

“W-Wha—” Shirou glared at Michiru, who only responded with a sheepish grin. “Tch. I can do it myself.”

“Hey, it’s no big deal. I owe you, anyways, from dragging you against the side of a building like that during that fight…” Pingua said apologetically, scratching the back of his head.

This wasn’t the first time he tried to make amends for that incident: inviting him for drinks at the bar, helping him out with random conflicts in Anima-City here and there, even offering to take him on a ‘pleasure flight’ to a nearby island. Shirou had made it abundantly clear that he was fine and all was well between them, but the man still seemed rather perturbed about it. Still, it would be rude to turn him down now that Michiru has called him here.

Shirou sighed. “Fine, do what you wish.”

Pingua gave a relieved smile and ambled towards him, easy as ever. An anxious feeling crept up in Shirou’s stomach again and tightened around his chest as the man approached him, and it only worsened when he sat himself behind him. 

“H-Hey, you’re too close,” Shirou growled, though it came out more like a broken plea.

“Relax, I’m not going to hurt you.” Pingua set a gentle hand on his shoulder, at which Shirou flinched in surprise. “Trust me, alright?”

“Alright,” Shirou muttered, quickly brushing away the birdman’s hand. He swore it felt like his palm was jolting electricity through his body.

At the nod of Shirou’s head, Pingua slowly combed his fingers through his hair, gingerly scratching his scalp while he was at it.

“Relaxing, isn’t it?”

“…Yeah… it is.” Shirou didn’t realize how tensed up his shoulders were until he let out a deep sigh, sinking his head back into Pingua’s hands. Time seemed to stretch out to infinity as Pingua ran his fingers up and down his hair, gathering it into a tight bundle. Whatever previous apprehension he felt had melted away, and Shirou’s eyes slid close, leaving him aware of only the slight tickling sensation ebbing and flowing across his head…

And Pingua’s scent, wrapping around him.

He was taught as a young beastman not to use his keen sense of smell to pry into other people’s businesses without good reason, but he couldn’t help but be a little curious about the ex-military beastman’s life. And, if there was to be any good reason for snooping around, perhaps he’d figure out why he felt so… _weird…_ around him.

Shirou let out a soft breath and inhaled, slow and deep.

...

Blue.

Cerulean and azure blending into one, stretching out as far as the eye can see.

The sea, vast and boundless.

The strong wind lifts him and his friends up and around and over— always shifting, always teasing.

His vision shifts.

He hears a gentle hum of a mother— Pingua’s, Shirou presumes. She gently strokes his hair, slicking back the white and tying up the brown waves into a ponytail, much like Pingua’s current style. He laughs, and his mother joins too, so free and alight, like everything is alright with the world.

The laughter fades away into a wisp, leaving behind only pitch-black darkness.

There’s gunfire, screams, groans and wails of the dead and dying— all of which Shirou himself is too familiar with. The only thing that penetrates through the night veil is the sight of blood and cold steel; the rest is a blur. He flings himself into the skies, evading flying bullets and monstrous human inventions. He doesn’t know where he’s going, he just knows that he has to escape—to _survive—_ in order to fight for another day. That’s what he promised to his comrades.

The gnashing and grinding of steel drown out, and now he’s kneeling in front of a grave— the one in Anima-City that the Mayor had built for him. There’s a noticeable droop in his shoulders, almost as if a burden has been weighing down on him this whole time. Several dog tags are dangling from his hand, and he clutches them to his heart as he rests his head on the cold stone.

He cries, wailing and letting everything that he’s kept buried within his heart—the guilt—claw its way out of his mouth. His shoulders tremble as he bends down to press his forehead onto the ground. He laughs, weak and pathetic, yet it’s more freeing than anything he’s ever felt before.

A phone buzzes in his pocket, and he takes it out to see a text from Michiru, mentioning something about setting something up with Shirou. His heartbeat quickens at the sight of his name, and he smiles unabashedly. 

He gets up, kisses the dog tags, and venerably places them back on the base of the gravestone before setting his goggles back on. He leaps into the air, transforming into his bird form with his shoulders back and his spine straight— as free as he could ever be. 

...

“Alright, I think that does it, Shirou. Shirou?”

Shirou’s eyes snapped open. He was so focused on Pingua’s memories that he almost forgot where he actually was. Wide-eyed, he whipped around to see a perplexed Pingua looking back at him.

“You ok?” he asked with one eyebrow raised, his eyes earnest and sincere.

“Y-Yeah, I’m fine. I, uh— Well, um, thank you. For helping out,” Shirou stammered. He reached back behind his head to feel the new bundle of hair, feeling heat rise to his eartips. His heart was still pounding from the lingering vortex of emotions from Pingua’s memories, not to mention the intimate proximity of said birdman to himself. There was just so much he had to inquire about now: about his childhood, about his mom, about that war, about his fallen friends, about his, uh, feelings that seemed to be similar to his own. He struggled to find the words to express himself, but as his fingers looped around his new ponytail, one memory bubbled up and swelled with nostalgia.

“Your mother,” Shirou said, breaking the silence, “she seemed to be a wonderful woman.”

Pingua’s eyes widened in shock, then furrowed before his gaze fell to the ground.

“Yeah, she was,” Pingua smiled wryly. “She taught me how to take care of myself— how to take care of my hair, in particular. Maybe someday I’ll pass down some secrets to you, Shirou.”

He laughed, though the strain in his voice didn’t escape Shirou’s ears. “Anyways, that nose of yours sure is something else, eh?”

Shirou looked away in guilt. It was only a lighthearted comment, but he knew he shouldn’t have done it. He had invaded Pingua’s privacy just to satisfy his own curiosity; there was no other way of looking at it, even if he meant no harm.

“Hey, it’s no big deal,” Pingua consoled him, patting his back. “Saves me the trouble of having to explain everything to you, at any rate. Don’t worry about it, alright?”

“But—”

“No ‘buts.’ Though, if you really want to call it even, then why don’t you meet up with me at the bar tonight? Share your story, enjoy a good drink— it’s all I ever did back in the military.”

Shirou opened and shut his mouth. His story… it wasn’t something he shared with other people so easily, aside from the Mayor. The reality is that 1000 years pass by much more quickly than one would think. His memory was unreliable; details easily became a foggy, tangled mess. Early on, he turned to keeping journals, but many of them have been damaged, lost, or have simply succumbed to the passage of time. He’s fortunate to have a large library to store all these journals, along with some old Nirvasyl relics, but it’s far from ideal.

Though, in the end, perhaps none of that is what Pingua meant. If not, then Shirou had zero clue how to go about opening himself up. But even then, he did owe it to him to at least try. Wasn’t like he had much of a choice, after all.

Sighing, he admitted defeat. “I can’t say I’m great at making conversation, but I’ll come.”

“Great. I’ll hold you to that, then,” Pingua smiled. “Anyways, enough of all that. I’ve got to say, you look pretty cute with this new hairstyle, if I do say so myself.”

Shirou jolted at the birdman’s sudden compliment and embarrassedly glanced away, muttering for him to shut up under his breath.

“You know, blushing like that only makes you cuter,” Pingua winked unabashedly.

"Shut it," Shirou growled in an attempt to brush him off, but it didn’t faze him in the slightest as he laughed in response.

“Hey, Michiru! Mind taking a pic of us?” Pingua gestured at the tanuki girl, who was playing around with a basketball in her hands, restless as ever.

“Oh, yeah, sure!”

Michiru tossed the ball aside and whipped out her phone.

Shirou looked back worriedly at Pingua, who only gave a cheeky smile and nudged him to face the camera.

“Ok. 3, 2, 1, cheese— eh?”

At that moment, Pingua leaned over his shoulder to kiss Shirou: a quick, chaste peck on the cheek. So quick that it took a few seconds for Shirou to register what had just happened.

“EHHHH?” Michiru exclaimed. “Pingua, you— ohmigosh, I need to tell Nazuna about this.”

It took a strong gust of wind to bring Shirou back to his senses, and he immediately whipped around in a frenzy just to see that Pingua had already transformed into his bird form, flying off in the distance, leaving behind a very confused wolf and a frenziedly-texting Michiru on the rooftop.

Shirou sat there, stunned, with his cheeks aflame, his heart pounding wildly against his chest, before he finally began to connect the dots.

What a fool he was, with his feelings all wrapped around that man’s finger.

**Author's Note:**

> The pic Michiru was referencing xd: https://twitter.com/genicecream/status/1265516476406120449
> 
> I love them sm... stupid sexy bird and grumpy tired choker-wearing twunk.
> 
> Thank you again for reading, and please leave a kudos and a comment if you enjoyed it!


End file.
